


Broken Hallelujah

by Annie17851



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Implied Relationships, M/M, Temporary Amnesia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-30
Updated: 2014-07-30
Packaged: 2018-02-11 02:55:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,411
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2050881
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Annie17851/pseuds/Annie17851
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Castiel has amnesia, temporarily, and is a bit confused.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Broken Hallelujah

**Author's Note:**

> Human!Cas has temporary amnesia and is a little confused about the relationships in the bunker; very general spoilers, mostly because they live in the bunker.

Broken Hallelujah 

 

Dean has driven all night to get to the bunker, Sam’s urgent “It’s Cas and it’s bad- get here!” looping around in his brain relentlessly. His head feels like it’s underwater and the rest of him just does whatever it has to do to drive the car. He is well over the speed limit and he knows it, but he also knows all the places where there could be speed traps. Fuck that, it’s Cas and it’s the middle of the night. Even the police are asleep. 

The only thing keeping Dean relatively calm is the fact that Cas isn't dead. After all, if Cas was dead Sam wouldn't tell Dean to hurry.

Dean’s “Where is he?” resonates through the bunker before he is even halfway across the threshold, but the shout is needless, because Sam is right there, below the stairs, pacing, waiting for him.

“In my room,” Sam says shortly, turning on his heels to lead the way, Dean brushing by him in his haste to get to Castiel.

The elder Winchester slows down just long enough to throw a puzzled glance back at his brother.

“It was closest, he couldn't walk,” Sam explains, keeping up easily with his long stride.

“What the hell happened? Who did it?” Dean throws behind him dangerously as he pounds down the halls toward his brother’s room. Just as he gets there and puts his hand on the half-open door, Sam’s grip on his arm stops him.

“Dean, wait. He’s not awake and he looks- really bad. I think he’s in a coma or something.”

Dean takes in the stricken look on Sam’s face and steels himself to enter the room. One look at Cas and his heart lurches in his chest and he stops breathing. That head-underwater feeling is back in spades and he might be drowning now.

Castiel, once-angel of the Lord, lies in Sam’s bed, covered to his shoulders with a light blanket. His skin is white-turning gray and there are so many gashes on his face and neck that Dean doesn't know where to look first. More troubling than those is the white gauze Sam has carefully wrapped around his head and Dean can see that some blood is seeping through, even now. 

Dean approaches the bed and, as carefully as he can, lifts the blanket to look at the rest of Cas, the long swaths of claw marks defiling the skin of Cas’s chest taking away what little breath Dean has left. Hellhound, he thinks, and Crowley, and red rage slithers across his brain and Dean is going to kill everything. He replaces the blanket gingerly, brings his face closer to Cas’s, determining the severity of the slashes for himself.

Dean calms his breathing and looks to his brother, who is standing agitatedly at the end of the bed. 

“Talk to me,” Dean commands tonelessly, dangerously quiet as he runs his hand soothingly down Cas’s arm under the blanket. 

Sam shakes his head. “I don’t know what happened- or WHO happened. I was having dinner and reading last night and I heard this heavy thump on the door. I grabbed a gun and went up to see and when I opened it, he just fell into my arms. He was covered in blood, mumbling your name. I carried him here, I tried to get him to tell me, but he was unconscious- like this – before I could get any info out of him. I was still running for the med kit when I called you. I did the best I could. I had to stitch the gash on his head, but I think the rest will be okay with the antibiotic creams and stuff. But his head….He really should be in a hospital, Dean.”

“Yea, that would go over big, first time they do some blood work on him and it comes out celestial wave-whatever. Even if he’s supposedly human now, you know we can’t take him there.”

Dean’s fists are clenched so hard his knuckles are white and Sam quietly fears for the breakables in his room. “I’m thinking Hellhound- and Crowley, and the first thing that happens when he wakes up is we find out for sure!” Dean declares. 

“Right there with you,” Sam agrees. Then, “Listen, I know you drove all night. If you want to sleep for a bit, I’ll sit here.”

“No,” Dean refuses, eyes turning to the still figure in Sam’s bed. “I won’t sleep. You were up all night, too, go rest.” He reaches out to pull the chair closer to the bed, settling himself in for some long hours of simply watching, looking up to stop Sam as he is leaving.

“Sammy,” Dean pauses when his brother turns back. “Good job (meaning thanks, Sam knows). “When he’s feeling better, we’ll move him to our room.” 

“Sure, Dean” Sam smiles encouragingly. 

……………

The next three days are spent with Dean and Sam taking turns, sitting by Cas, washing Cas, changing Cas’s head bandages and smoothing all kinds of ointments on Cas’s wounds. The brothers are encouraged by the slight day-by-day improvement in the color of Castiel’s skin tone, but still dismayed by the fact that he isn't waking up, or showing even the slightest signs of doing so. Dean goes out on simple hunts in overkill mode, avenging Cas’s assault by decimating everything paranormal he comes into contact with. 

Then, on the fourth day, Castiel opens his eyes.

Sam is dozing in the chair near the bed when he jerks awake and blinks to clear his head, not quite comprehending that the patient is awake. He leans forward urgently, hand coming to rest on Cas’s arm gently. Cas’s eyes are really open, but the ocean-blue is washed-out and pale and Sam has no idea what that might mean, if anything. They just don’t look – right.

“Cas?” Sam whispers. Then, slightly louder, “Castiel!”

A blink, then Cas’s head turns to Sam slowly.

“Where am I? What happened?” he rasps out, voice even deeper than usual from the past days’ disuse. 

“You’re safe!” Sam assures him. “Hang on, stay awake!”

Sam goes to the door and shouts down the hallway to Dean’s room, where he knows his brother is trying futilely to sleep, then goes right back to the bedside, a hand on Cas’s shoulder comfortingly.

A worse-for-wear-looking Dean stumbles into the room, stopping abruptly at the foot of the bed, thank God, thank Chuck or whoever flashing through his mind at the sight of Cas’s open eyes. Cas, who is currently trying to sit up, against Sam’s gently restraining arms.

“No, Cas, lay back.” Sam is admonishing quietly and Dean moves to help, but the jolt of pain in Castiel’s head and the slashes on his chest convince him that sitting up isn't a good plan. He grits his teeth through a nearly-silent moan and then regards the two brothers at his bedside.

“Cas, what happened? Who did this? Or what?” Dean wants to know and Castiel just stares at him, bewildered and overwhelmed. 

“Am I Cas? That’s my name?” he asks foggily.

Dean and Sam exchange startled looks.

“Cas. Castiel.” Dean explains. “You’re in the bunker. You’re safe.”

“I don’t feel safe.” Cas protests agitatedly. “Why am I in a bunker? I don’t even know who you are!”

…………

“He doesn't even know who I am!” Dean is raging, pacing back and forth in the library like a wild man. Sam is leaning on the long table, trying to be a calming voice of reason, trying to keep the volume down so Cas can’t hear them. Or at least if he can hear them, their words won’t be distinct enough for him to understand. The laptop is on the table, several sites open to articles about amnesia. 

“So get this. Hopefully, this is temporary. As his head wound heals, it could all come back to him. In the meantime, we have to be patient, wait and see what happens. First thing is, we need to get him better, Maybe, when he can get out of bed and walk around a bit, things will jog his memory.”

Dean stops pacing long enough to nod his head in agreement. “But I still need to know who did this- as soon as his memory comes back.”

“We’ll find out,” Sam promises. “But Dean,” Sam pauses, knowing his next suggestion won’t go over well. “If Cas is ready to move out of my room in a day or two, he should probably go into a room of his own. We shouldn't try to force the memories.”

“Yea,” Dean agrees brusquely. “I’ll get one ready.” And he stomps off down the hall to the room that used to be Cas’s. Before.

………..

Two mornings later, Dean returns from a diner breakfast run to find Castiel actually sitting up in bed, with fresh bandages around his head and his cell phone in his hand, pointing at the screen for Sam. Sam is sitting on the bed next to Cas and the patient’s newly-cleaned clothes are on the bed between them.

“Pancakes,” Dean announces with forced cheerfulness. “Blueberry, and a vanilla latte, your fa…” He stops talking abruptly at Sam’s quick look. They have decided to let Cas decide for himself how he wants to remember.

“Cas asked to see what was in his pockets,” Sam explains. “There was just some cash, the keys to the bunker. And the Impala. (That had raised Sam’s eyebrow a bit. He doesn't have a key to the Impala.) And his cell phone.” Sam has surreptitiously pocketed the credit card Dean had given Cas, not wanting to try to explain why they told him that his name was Castiel when his credit card says it’s Lee Majors.

Dean sets the bags down on the small table in the corner and comes closer to look. “Who've you got there, Cas?” He asks, leaning in to peer at the list of contacts Cas is studying.

“It appears Sam is number 1,” Cas replies, finger on the small screen, shooting a tentative smile in Sam’s direction. “You are number 2. There’s a Garth, a Charlie and a Sheriff Mills. Will you tell me who they are?”

“I guess, since you see them in your phone,” Dean relents. “They’re friends of ours. And yours. Just FYI, Charlie is a girl and so is the Sheriff. Jody Mills.”

“Is Charlie or the Sheriff my girlfriend?” Cas asks slowly.

Sam clears his throat quietly. “You don’t have a girlfriend, Cas.”

Cas frowns. “Am I your brother?”

“No,” Dean tells him, and Cas can’t help but notice the quickly-disappearing smile on Sam’s face.

“Do I live here, then?

Dean stands away from the bed abruptly. “You live here. With us. And rules of the bunker say it’s breakfast time.” He pulls the table closer to the bed and lays out the pancakes and the sweet drink he knows Cas likes. “Maybe, after you eat, we’ll take a walk down the hall to your room.”

Cas smiles gratefully in Sam’s direction. “I suppose I've put you out long enough, Sam.”

It’s later, after Cas is settled in the spare room next to Dean’s, the room that actually used to be Cas’s until he and Dean eventually decided to share one, that Sam finds his brother sitting in the dark in front of the tv. They have turned one of the bunker’s many rooms into the tv and game room, but Dean isn't watching or gaming at the moment. Dean is doing what Sam can only classify as brooding. Dean has a glass half full of ice and whisky resting on his thigh, balanced by the tip of one finger on the rim.

“He’s getting better, physically at least,” Sam muses, settling in a chair across from his brother.

“Seems like,” Dean replies shortly, ice clinking on glass as he takes another drink. “You palmed that credit card, right?”

“Oh, yea,” Sam admits. “That would have taken way too much explanation. We need to go slow.”

“Yea, Sammy, you need to watch what you say, especially when Cas is hanging on your every word. You are number one, after all.”

Light dawns in Sam’s mind. Ah, yes, hence the brooding and the whiskey.

“Dean, Cas doesn't remember. As soon as he starts to, we can tell him that the reason I’m number one on his call list is because he is usually always with you when he needs to use it. Our priority now is to get him well. We have to believe that he’ll remember, and you and he…” 

“Good things don’t happen to us, Sam,” Dean responds coolly. “For now, I believe I’ll have another drink.” 

………

Weeks drag by slowly, with Castiel getting better and stronger every day. He still has no memory of anything before he woke up in Sam’s room. Boredom has driven him to the bunker’s huge library of ancient books, and he has figured out for himself what really goes on here. Dean often finds them, Cas and Sam, heads together over some old, dusty book or other at the big table in the library. Dean and Sam have discussed taking more local, easy hunts, alternating turns, so Cas isn't ever left alone, but more often than not, Dean insists on taking Sam’s turns as well as his own. Sam recognizes his brother’s utter frustration with the situation, knows Dean wants to be out hunting on the off chance he might run into Crowley, get some information about what happened to Castiel. Or better yet, some payback.

One evening, Dean returns from a simple salt-and-burn to find Sam and Castiel in the kitchen. Castiel is laughing and the sound tears at Dean’s insides. Cas is in jeans and a t-shirt and the bandages have been gone from his head for a few days now, revealing the ever-messy dark hair. Cas has gone back to having a little scruff on his jaw as well, falling automatically into old-Cas-mode without even realizing it. 

Sam and Cas are at the counter, some top 40 station on the radio, cooking something that smells suspiciously like burgers.

“You’re cooking,” Dean observes needlessly, trying to ignore the obvious camaraderie at the stove, but his heart drops hurtfully at the sight of the huge grin Cas directs at Sam before he turns to greet the hunter. “Bacon cheeseburgers – your favorite, according to Sam. We figured you’d appreciate them after a long day at the ‘office’.” And Cas actually raises his arms to air quote ‘office’ and Dean is going to throw up any minute now.

Sam is watching his brother carefully, and Dean simply forces a smile. “Smells great. Let me go wash up.”

It’s really hard to swallow around the growing lump in his throat, but Dean manages to eat three bacon cheese burgers, much to Cas’s delight. 

Before Cas retires for the night, Dean takes his turn at tending the healing wounds on the ex-angel. His head wound, stitched with Sam’s considerable expertise, has healed extremely well, and any scar that might remain will be hidden by the dark, tousled hair. The wounds on his face have healed completely, leaving no trace to mar what Dean has always considered perfect. Dean has to consciously resist running a finger along the scruffy jawline, knows that it’s much too intimate a gesture and aching to do it anyway. The slashes on Cas’s chest have almost healed entirely, and Dean welcomes the opportunity to touch Cas, runs his fingers gently down the lines on the warm skin that will be slight scars in the end. Steels his resolve that someone, some day, will pay dearly for this. 

They are in Castiel’s room and Sam is in the library, so he can’t hear them. 

“Dean,” Cas begins tentatively.

“You’re gonna be fine, Cas.” Dean tells him firmly.

“I know that. Thank you. You and Sam have done so much for me. I just….”

“Just what?” Dean asks, puzzled. 

Castiel sighs uncertainly. “If I ask you something, will you actually answer me? Or do I have to figure everything out on my own?”

Dean hesitates. He thinks if Cas is remembering something, or figuring something out, then he deserves to know the truth. Hope starts crawling around in Dean’s chest, tiny tendrils of longing waiting for Cas’s next words. 

“Shoot. I‘ll do my best.” Dean promises.

Cas looks down at his hands, uncomfortable. 

“I just….Am I……Am I with Sam? Does Sam love me?” Cas blurts out.

Dean’s heart has just stopped and he is drowning again. He can’t talk. Don’t look at Cas, don’t let him see the wreck of you, his mind is telling him. Happily, Cas has a little more to say. Gives Dean time to remember how to speak.

“Why do I live here? Why can’t I go out on hunts with you?”

Okay, that’s easy enough. Dean finds his voice, finally, hopes Castiel doesn't hear the devastation in it. 

“You’re not going out on hunts with us, one, because you were hurt and two, because you don’t remember how. We just saved you, we can’t get you killed.” Dean is trying to deliberately avoid the question of why Cas lives there.

Castiel nods in agreement. “And Sam?” he prods gently. 

Castiel’s eyes have long since returned to their deep blue and Dean looks right into them, heart stuttering madly in his chest.

“Sam is not in love with you, you are not in love with each other.” He tells Cas quietly.

Cas looks confused.” Oh. Thank you for being truthful. I’d like to sleep now.”

“Yea, sure,” Dean assents. “Good night, Cas.”

 

Dean heads right to the library, where he knows Sam will be at this hour. He slams his hands on the table to make sure he has Sam’s undivided attention.

“Cas thinks it’s you and him! Together! Tell me why he would think that, baby bro!”

Sam closes the laptop, thoughtful frown on his face. “That’s not good.”

“No shit, really?” Dean glares at him.

Sam raises his hands in protest. “I don’t know, Dean! Maybe it’s because you keep insisting on taking all the hunts and leaving us here. Maybe he thinks you’re trying to let us, I don’t know, bond or something.”

Dean tones down the glare and softens it to mere frustration. “Okay. Maybe you need to start taking the hunts and I need to spend more time with him.”

“Think you should just tell him?” Sam suggests logically. “Maybe it’s been long enough.”

“No,” Dean refuses. “And don’t you tell him either. It’s not obligation I want him to feel.”

Dean heads out of the library and toward the stairs to the door. “He’s in bed. I need a drink.”

“Dean,” Sam calls after him, but Dean doesn't turn back. 

 

…………..

 

The very next day, Sam takes over the hunting and Dean takes over the day-to-day stuff with Castiel. Cas wants to feel useful, and as he wanders through the days, helping with cooking, laundry, or sorting books in the huge library, he realizes that the tiny, frequent feelings of déjà-vu that make something flutter in his stomach might just be his memory starting to come back. He doesn't talk to Dean or Sam about this, because he doesn't want to get their hopes up, but his head wound is just about totally healed now and he is feeling a lot better than when he first woke up.

Cas is taking clothes out of the dryer and folding them, separating them into their respective piles by owner, when Dean discovers that they are out of beer, burritos and burger meat. Dean’s three Bs of necessity. 

“Cas, will you be okay if I run to the store for a couple of minutes?” Dean calls into the laundry room.

Cas sighs tolerantly. “Yes, Dean. I’ll be okay,” he replies, internally rolling his eyes, because doing that for real seems a little disrespectful. 

Dean is gone by the time Castiel is done sorting the clothes and he figures he might as well deliver them to their appropriate bedrooms. The brothers usually just come to the laundry room and get their things, but Cas wants to be useful and he has nothing else to do anyway.

He hasn't been in Sam’s room since he woke up there several weeks ago, and he hasn't been in Dean’s at all. Not DA anyway- During Amnesia.

Sam’s room, of course, looks exactly the same as when he last saw it, and he puts the pile of clean clothes on the bed, eyes taking in the weapons, books and journals that make up the entirety of the decor.

Castiel steps through the doorway into Dean’s room and feels such a huge, gut-wrenching wave of déjà-vu that it stops him cold. He shakes his head, trying to clear the almost-something behind his eyes, but then the feeling goes away. He walks over to the bed, sure steps across the floor, and deposits the clothes on it absently, eyes traveling over the room curiously. 

Castiel is a little surprised. Dean has a crucifix on the shelf above his bed, incongruously placed among an assortment of weapons. A small framed picture rests there as well, a pretty blonde woman with a young boy that can only be Dean himself. More weapons on the bedside tables, and he already knows from idle conversation that there’s a big knife under the pillow. Cas feels intrusive suddenly and is heading back out of the room when another picture, this one taped on the mirror near the door, catches his attention. 

It’s a picture of himself and Dean, leaning against the side of a big black car. It looks like they had parked off a dirt road near a huge old tree and it’s obviously autumn, colorful leaves all around them, but it’s not the actual beauty of the shot that interests Cas. It’s the two subjects. Himself and Dean. Half turned toward each other, beer bottles in hand, and it looks like he and Dean had been having a conversation and had been asked to look at the camera for a moment so someone, most probably Sam, could snap a photo. Castiel can just about hear it in his head; laughing with Dean about something, Sam calling out “Guys!” and smiling his Sammy-smile when they turn to look at him and he captures them on film. 

Castiel puts two fingers on the photo carefully, tracing the clean lines of what must be Dean’s prized Impala, wishing he could remember what they had been talking about, or, more likely, laughing about, because Dean looks entirely relaxed and happy leaning against his Baby. Cas’s brain is remembering the smell of leather and gas, the sound of creaky, heavy metal doors and the sensation of Dean. Being with Dean.

On a whim, Castiel goes back into Sam’s room and looks around. No personal pictures displayed here. He takes one more look at the photo in Dean’s room. Odd that the strongest hunter’s armor seems to have the biggest chinks. 

Cas knows Dean will be back any second, so he heads to the library and takes down one of the oldest, heaviest books, staring at the pages blankly, trying to make his brain reset itself. 

………

Nothing is said by either Winchester about the fact that Castiel took their clothes to their rooms. So two days later, Cas decides to go a bit further.

Dean gets up from the breakfast table to announce that he has received a call from another hunter in a town about fifty miles away. It’s someone well-known to Garth and he claims to have urgent information about a witch coven in his area. Dean’s going to talk to him and decide if there’s a real case or not.

Castiel puts his coffee mug down decisively and looks up at Dean. “I would like to go along. I feel like I haven’t been outside in fresh air in forever.”

Dean hesitates. He would be glad for the company, and the memory of the last time he and Cas road-tripped together is definite incentive to say yes. But, there’s that but. 

Dean shakes his head. “I don’t know, Cas. You’re safe here from – whatever. This place is warded to the teeth.”

“So’s the car,” Sam reminds his brother, going to the counter for another cup of coffee. Dean knows Sam thinks that being in the car will jump start Cas’s memory. So to speak.

“He’ll be with you, Dean,” Sam reasons. “What could happen?”

“I could carry a weapon,” Cas proposes hopefully, and that makes Dean cringe inwardly, because he can remember a time when Castiel himself was a weapon. Now he has fallen so far, lost his home, lost his mind, lost everything, and all that is ultimately laid at Dean’s feet.

Dean relents then, rewarded with the thankful smile on his ex-angel’s face. 

“No weapon,” the hunter dictates, turning on his heels to head for the garage, knowing that Castiel is trailing right behind him.

Castiel has not been to the bunker’s garage yet, and he is impressed with the line-up of old, apparently well-cared-for cars. Dean’s Impala is parked at the far end, close to the doors in case of an emergency exit. Cas slows when he gets to the shiny black vehicle, running his fingers lightly up the smooth metal, mimicking what he did the other day to the Impala in Dean’s photo. He can feel Dean watching him and expects to be chided for touching, but that doesn't happen.

It doesn't happen because Dean has paused on the driver’s side, watching Castiel regard – touch – the car almost reverently. Images from their last road trip are tearing through Dean’s head; lonely back roads, a thunderstorm with the most incredible lightening Dean had ever seen, a rugaru burning up in a forest and the subsequent trip through the drive-through for cheeseburgers and Cokes, laughing most of the way back home, Cas being impolite enough to let Dean know how terrible his singing actually was. And then asking Dean to sing again anyway.

Dean opens the door and swings into the driver’s seat before Cas sees him watching, turning the key, the throaty rumble of the big engine echoing off the walls in the huge space. Castiel smiles involuntarily as he climbs into the passenger seat and he thinks he must have enjoyed that sound. Before. 

“I’d like to say this is just like old times, but I’m not actually sure that’s true,” Cas jokes, but he sighs to himself then because he thinks Dean isn't really amused anyway.

“Almost,” Dean mumbles sullenly, more to himself than to Cas.

“So, music?” Dean asks, reaching to turn the volume up on the radio, deter any conversation Cas might be thinking of having as he pulls out of the garage and heads away from the bunker.

“Sure,” Cas replies, turning his head to watch the world go by on his side of the highway. 

What his passenger is doing is so –Cas - that Dean can’t even look at him, can’t bear to look at this version of Castiel. This Cas that doesn't know. 

But Castiel isn't trying to avoid conversation, not really. Castiel can’t talk, can’t form words around the knots in his stomach that are starting to creep their way into his throat, because this car, this leather smell, Dean driving and this music, this flying down the highway and feeling the tires eating up the asphalt, this Cas- this is the Cas he was before someone, something, took it away from him. Cas wants it back, wants to remember. He leans his darkly messy head against the window and closes his eyes, stops the visual input and lets his mind run wherever it wants to go, lets it follow Dean’s Impala impetuously to whatever end point his brain maps out for itself.

Cas looks like he might be napping, and they still have a good amount of miles before them, so Dean tries to be less, he doesn't know what, maybe less stressed, about this. 

Castiel can hear Dean singing along with the radio softly, probably not wanting to annoy his passenger. As much as Dean seems to like singing along, Cas is thinking that he was never really any good at it and whoa, where did that come from, because that is something that Castiel shouldn't be able to remember. Cas fights the urge to open his eyes, doesn't want to let Dean know he is really listening, because he thinks Dean will stop and Cas is enjoying the off-key performance. Suddenly, Cas sees. Sees everything that has transpired between the three of them at the bunker since he woke up. Revisits snatches of overheard conversations between the brothers. 

Castiel pulls his head away from the window slowly, sitting up straighter and reaching over to lower the volume on the radio. 

Dean shoots a grin at him despite the feelings he is trying to push down. He starts talking and can’t stop himself. 

“You know, this is one of my favorite songs. Ramble On, by Led Zeppelin? This song made Rolling Stone’s top 500 list and a lot of the lyrics were influenced by Tolkien’s Lord of….”

“It’s not Sam, is it?” Castiel interrupts quietly. 

Dean frowns, pausing mid-ramble.

“What’s not?” he asks distractedly.

“It’s not Sam who loves me.”

Dean doesn't remember until later that night to give himself credit for not wrecking the car, for remembering to glance in the rear-view mirror before he skids to a halt on the shoulder of the road. 

“No, Cas, it’s not!” Dean tells him, voice a lot sharper than he intends and he all but flees from the car, stomping around to the passenger side and waiting apprehensively as Cas steps out to meet him. (God, seriously, Dean thinks, can I be more of a chick?)

“You asked me before.” Dean reminds him

“I know. I’m not an idiot, Dean….” Cas starts.

“Never said that,” Dean interjects.

Cas holds up a hand, knows even in his now-half-amnesiac state that this is one of those chick-flick things Dean abhors. 

“I don’t remember a lot, Dean. I do remember hours upon hours in this car with you. I remember feeling – I feel – things. I’m not even human, am I?” 

“Better than.” Dean tells him, and puts his hands firmly in his pockets so he won’t reach out and touch Cas’s face like he so desperately wants to, now that it seems he almost can, that Castiel would welcome it. 

“I took the laundry to your rooms, that day you went to the store.” Castiel admits, and Dean shifts to lean against the car, realizes he and Sam never thought about it. About what Cas might glean from just a trip to Dean’s room. 

“And,” Dean prompts, head turning to face Cas squarely and Castiel can’t help thinking about the photo in the bedroom, how they are very nearly in the exact same positions as that day. That day Dean was smiling and it’s just then that it dawns on Cas that he has barely seen a smile on Dean’s face these past weeks.

“There’s a picture on the mirror in your room. I don’t think it’s your room. I think it’s our room. And since I’m starting to get my memory back, I want you to tell me about it now.”

Castiel has such an earnest look on his face that Dean knows he is going to tell him the whole story, beginning to end, and damn the consequences. 

“It’s a while till we get to where we’re going and maybe we’ll stop for burgers.” Dean tells the once-angel. “It’s a long and complicated story,” he warns. 

“Apparently, I have plenty of time,” Castiel replies, opening the car door and resuming his seat.

Dean takes a shaky breath and heads back to the driver’s seat, re-starting the powerful engine and pulling back out onto the highway.

“So, ready for it?” he asks Cas hopefully.

Castiel tilts his head slightly, pondering. “I think the term is ‘I’m all ears’, but I’m not quite sure.” (And, oh, that is so Castiel it makes Dean’s hope burn in his chest.)

Dean spares a glance away from the road to look in renewed awe at his angel, and then dives right in.

“You’re the one who gripped me tight and raised me from Perdition.”


End file.
